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Our next HO racing at the Barn is a WHO Mod & Tuners night on Wednesday 3 July.

We'll be building one of Simon's classic Mod tracks from 2018...

   

Doors open at 6.15pm for practice, allowing us the flexibility to start the heats early and guarantee a pre-9.30 finish.

As always, WHO Tuners club cars and DS controllers are available for those giving HO a go for the first time. Entry is £3 for adults and £2 for under-16s. We ask that any racers aged 13 and below bring a responsible adult with them.

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A big thanks to Gareth for putting together the post-race coverage from this round...

Gareth's Race Report

July marks the start of the second half of the WHO season and the run in to the championships being decided.  It’s kind of depressing to already be talking about the end of the year in the summer so let’s get excited about racing instead!  The track for this round was a sprawling monster but was relatively simple to drive which always means exciting racing. A couple of corners required a bit of blind driving due to some obscured sightlines but it was the same for everyone.  

Track setup proved a little more complicated than usual in the absence of our beloved Chairman Andy.  I’m sure you’ll all join me in wishing him a pleasant recovery period and hopefully a return in August.  Some technical issues with pieces of track and the driver station fuses took a while to sort so we were delayed starting racing and chasing catch up all night.

We had a whole host of new drivers to welcome including Dave, Ian, Matthew A, Steve, Clive and Will.  

The early contenders in Mod were Matthew and Pete before more of the heavy hitters started getting their runs in.  Oli W, Terry, John and Jerome were all up in the top 7.  Tracy and Mike McCann were eyecatching in 8th and 7th.  But it was Keith who blitzed the field as he stormed 5 laps clear to take pole position.  While still complaining that his cars felt off.  If that was off pace, then Cthulhu help us when they get on pace!

The Junior battle would be decided between Ollie B and Isaac with Dylan running in Tuners but hopeful of taking a Mod scalp or two. Isaac had other ideas with a brilliant qualifying to go 5th overall.  Ollie’s runs were punctuated with the sound of his Viper hitting the barriers on a worryingly regular basis which doomed him to a lower than normal final.

Ryan, Ash and Oli were doing well on race control until they discovered that Ryan had somehow been missed from the heat entries.  Did he forget his own name or is there secretly bad blood between the brothers?  We’ll never know!  An on the spot compromise saw Ryan do 3 heats with late arrivals Clive and Will to seed our grid.  Ozzy sadly had to depart before the finals (get well soon buddy) along with some of our other new drivers.  We look forward to welcoming you back soon.

All of the lanes were pretty even but most drivers picked yellow over white lane when faced with a gutter option.  Except for Ollie B who is clearly a mad lad in the making.  

The I Final commenced with Matthew A taking on Will and Kevin with his troublesome Mega G+.  I’m hoping that some kind MG+ expert cough cough Keith cough cough will take a look at it and get the car straightened out.  Several crashes hampered Kevin’s run but he did take the fastest lap of the final on his way to p2.  Will was a lap behind as he struggled to get to grips with the club cars.  But he seemed keen on buying some of his own cars so I’m excited to see what he buys.  So it was Matthew A who won the race and advanced up to white lane in the H Final.

Matthew didn’t find white lane as much to his liking as yellow lane as he failed to get up from that p4 spot on the grid.  Clive had claimed family bragging rights over Will in the heats and he also beat Matthew here by a lap.  Ian played it cautious in red lane, electing for a steady rhythm on his way to p2 while up ahead it was Dave who banged in 15 laps with the quickest time seen in the finals so far and an average laptime not far off that fastest lap too.  Great drive Dave!

Dave’s reward was the white lane in the G Final and again, he struggled to make it work and was mired in 4th place.  Meanwhile Kev had borrowed Gareth’s new neo Bulldog after a couple of heats with the club cars.  Vipers aren’t his thing.  The Bulldog was not performing well, the problem traced eventually to the addition of a Turbo axle retainer.  Removing that unlocked some performance and showed that we could be on course for a fun season next year in the MG+/Bulldog battle.  

Steve P had a brilliant run in blue lane on his way to p2 including achieving a Median laptime of 7.777 seconds which was rather fun!  He didn’t have an answer though for Nathan in red lane who became our newest fastest finals driver as he stormed to 16 laps and the win.

As mentioned before, Ollie had chosen white lane for the F Final and he’d be going up against Dylan who had a Lifelike T he was comfortable driving and he felt confident against Ollie’s erratic qualifying performance.  Ollie had other ideas and engaged beast mode.  22 laps without a single off wrecked Dylan’s world and consigned him to p2.  Both Juniors had been fast and consistent which bodes well for the next few years of them battling with Dexter and Isaac for the titles. Gary went from blue lane and although he too was into the 5 second lap range, too many offs ruined his challenge.  Nathan had consistency for another 16 lap run like he had managed in red lane but that just wasn’t enough against the competition.

Into the E Final and Ollie remained in the white lane, the first stepping up driver to not have to move lane.  Were we witnessing a tactical stroke of genius or a lucky coincidence that his favoured lane was everyone else’s cast off? Whatever it was it seemed to work as Ollie engaged in a fierce battle with Deborah who was uncharacteristically far down the order.  It was a close and tense fight but OIlie just clinched it which I think surprised even him.  Just look at the relief on his face in the video!  Ash meanwhile achieved a great 20 lap run in red lane but that 4/10ths deficit in fastest lap compared to the top 2 really held him back.  A little more tinkering and that car should come good.  Rob meanwhile obviously drew the short straw out of the two Bean Vipers as he finished a rather lowly 4th.  

Ollie remained in white lane once again for D Final.  It was Gareth who took the early lead in his Tuners Lifelike before Tracy unleashed the full power of her Viper, taking the lead in commanding fashion and devastating the competition with a blistering 4.5 second lap.  Those big sounding barrier shots were back as Ollie lost focus and began to crash regularly again.  Mike meanwhile was battling hard against his wife but the second McCann Viper had less downforce or maybe a less skilled driver (just kidding Mike, you rock!) so while he remained on the lead lap, he was a full 6/10ths slower on his fastest lap.  Further back, Gareth’s venerable (old and worn out!) Lifelike lost its rear axle and the delay doomed him to 4th.  

Tracy took over white lane from Ollie for the C Final and would be up against a star studded field.  Multiple Junior and Adult champion Jerome is fearsome with any car he drives.  Ryan has unlocked his capabilities in both digital and HO to become one of the outright fastest drivers in the club.  And then there is John.  The doctor of WHO is renowned for his intense focus when he is on a fast drive.  Tonight was no exception as he took the C Final by the horns and banged out 26 laps, lapping as low as a 4.1 second lap.   He’s just ridiculously good when he’s in that form!  Jerome didn’t make it easy and also made 26 laps, he also had a better average laptime but sometimes a race just doesn’t go your way.  Ryan was on the back foot all night after the snafu in the heat setup. Being an absolute gentleman, he also threw away his practice time to give the newcomers a chance.  As we’ve seen in the past, it can sometimes be difficult to know your car’s ultimate pace if you’ve not been in heats or practice with comparable machinery.  I think that was the case for Ryan here as he finished 3rd on 21 laps.  In white lane, Tracy must have been wondering what happened as trailed home in 4th.  
 
The B Final was a mouthwatering prospect indeed.  Everyone knew the prize on offer; a drive in the A Final on a very even track.  This meant that even the vacant white lane could still be a race winning prospect if they nailed the next 2 minutes.  The B Final pole can sometimes be such a poisoned chalice. That driver will have been the 4th quickest in the heats but they have to win this race to stake that spot and the three other drivers will have a target painted firmly on the pole driver’s forehead!

It was Isaac who held that slightly unenviable position this time and he elected to go from yellow lane.  Terry and Matthew had the coveted red and blue lanes respectively while John would be going from white.  Isaac was super hooked up and clearly wanted to emulate Jerome and others who would regularly make the A Final as Juniors.  A dominant performance saw him cruise to 26 laps with the fastest lap of the race.  John drove the absolute wheels off his Viper to come home p2 a couple of laps behind.  Terry and Matthew both had the one lap pace but not the consistency to compete as they trailed home 3rd and 4th respectively.  Check out the video to see the agony on Matthew’s face when he had a huge off!  

And so we came to the A Final with Keith defending his pole position from Pete, Oli W and the stepping up Isaac.  Pete has been the form man for Mod this season and it might have been those early track issues that held him back from pole this time out.  With those all fixed he was on absolute fire from blue lane and put Keith to the toughest test he could.  Keith led the first 5 laps but once Pete took the lead, he was able to ease himself to a lap clear at the flag.  Oli in 3rd had no answer for either of the top 2 as he drove to a lonely 3rd.  And it was a case of what might have been for Isaac who had a lengthy pitstop for repairs by Kev as he exhorted his dad to get him back on track to no avail.  

So Pete picked up the win from Keith, Oli and Isaac.  Brilliant job from all 4 drivers as Isaac picked up the Junior crown.  It was Gareth who took Tuners but he must surely be getting troubled by those increasing reliability problems.  

A massive thank you to everyone who pitched in and built the track, kept us going through the night, did race control and put everything away.  It’s never easy when Andy isn’t with us but you guys did a brilliant job.

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And more thanks to Gareth for putting together this video…